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The Four Quadrants of Conformism

paulgraham.com

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Re: The Four Quadrants of Conformism

#671

Post by pjscott »

kristianc wrote: post #607
smhost wrote: post #587

This is so meandering and incoherent that it's hard to comment on, but the idea that silicon valley and finance types are "independent-minded" is downright laughable. It's pretty clear that those types are in lock-step with each other ideologically, maybe broadly split between east-coast and west-coast aesthetically. This categorization is such nonsense. People in the hard sciences don't neatly fall into a type, and…

Right - and there’s the tacit assumption flowing throughout is that the ‘independent thinkers’ have only good things to say, and that societal norms have not evolved for any good reason. The state, particularly the welfare state, is partly a recognition that together we can achieve a level of protection for each other that we cannot achieve independently. And if the independent thinkers don’t much feel like writing o…

Regarding your first paragraph, consider these two claims:

1. Progress comes from people who are willing to ignore conventional wisdom and social norms.

2. The conventional wisdom is mostly wise, and social norms evolved in ways that are mostly good.

These claims don't conflict. It's entirely possible for independent thinkers to be mostly wrong, much wronger than the mainstream, and to be essential for progress. Most changes may not be improvements, but every improvement is still a change.

Re: The Four Quadrants of Conformism

#672

Post by TomMckenny »

[edit]

I had a lengthy more thoughtful post here but it seems I had mistaken a pronouncement for a discussion. The near instant voting response made me realize that absurdity, especially in light of the fact that I am responding to the second of two posts by the site's governance where college professors are singled out as a threat to freedom even as unmarked vans and secretive police round up the "dreaded" diversity proponents in Portland and other cities.

So I shall leave it to persons devoted to maximizing short term profits from new products and the "freethinking" commentary from persons seeking funding from same, to bloviate on how to "protect" society from intellectuals and liberalism.

Re: The Four Quadrants of Conformism

#673

Post by abathur »

enoch_r wrote: post #487
AlexandrB wrote: post #436

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whenever I see lists like this, what's interesting to me is what's omitted. In this particular case I don't see mention of workers getting fired for trying to organize or advocate for unions[1]. I don't see the abuse that gets piled on cops who report the misdeeds of their colleagues[2]. And I don't see the NFL effectively blacklisting Colin Kaepernick for his views on police brutality. It seems like it's only "cance…

I'll add Colin Kaepernick to the list for next time! I should also include things like the woman who lots her internship after she made a bad pro-BLM analogy: https://jonathanturley.org/2020/07/03/ima-stab-you-connectic... In my mind, "cancel culture" refers to the phenomenon where an outraged group (usually on social media) seeks to retaliate against someone over a (possibly inferred) political opinion. Firing union…

I'm glad you're expanding the list a little, but I'd also encourage you (and anyone else reading) to reflect on the difference and asymmetry, here.

(Rhetorical questions--no answer needed) What's the bottom-line difference in getting fired for roughly free-speech reasons by an employer of their own accord, or of their own accord but because a single person wrote them to bring your behavior to their attention, or instead because of a Twitter mob or a petition or a letter-writing campaign or a flood of bad news coverage or a boycott started by some group? How do we adjudicate which path is worse?

Part of what I find frustrating about this debate (as someone who takes this risk seriously, and has for a while) is selectiveness of the cases/scope/concerns that get brought up by a certain segment of outlets eager to catalog certain cases to build a narrative about who is censorious and who is censored.

There's a long history of people mobbing decision-makers (at schools, or libraries, businesses, media standards boards, advertisers, etc.) to lobby for action against things they don't like. The Dixie Chicks got caught in this fire. When One Million Moms threatened JCPenney over their deal with Ellen DeGeneres--what obvious outcome were they demanding? (They keep a brag-list of things they've gotten canceled at https://onemillionmoms.com/successes/, and a list of ~20 current campaigns. You can find even more at their parent org, AFA).

There are numerous teachers over the years who claim they were fired for being an atheist, teaching evolution, and a sad graveyard of articles about teachers sacked for exactly how they taught sex ed (of particular irony in this case, those fired for not teaching top-down abstinence-only dogma), or what books they're teaching.

(I realize this list is itself biased; I'm advocating expanding the umbrella, and suspicion of slanted lists, not trying to whatabout.)

Re: The Four Quadrants of Conformism

#674

Post by kristianc »

pjscott wrote: post #671
kristianc wrote: post #607

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right - and there’s the tacit assumption flowing throughout is that the ‘independent thinkers’ have only good things to say, and that societal norms have not evolved for any good reason. The state, particularly the welfare state, is partly a recognition that together we can achieve a level of protection for each other that we cannot achieve independently. And if the independent thinkers don’t much feel like writing o…

Regarding your first paragraph, consider these two claims: 1. Progress comes from people who are willing to ignore conventional wisdom and social norms. 2. The conventional wisdom is mostly wise, and social norms evolved in ways that are mostly good. These claims don't conflict. It's entirely possible for independent thinkers to be mostly wrong, much wronger than the mainstream, and to be essential for progress. Most…

> These claims don't conflict. It's entirely possible for independent thinkers to be mostly wrong, much wronger than the mainstream, and to be essential for progress. Most changes may not be improvements, but every improvement is still a change.

Which is precisely why this framework is too reductive to be of any real explanatory value.

At some point, someone has to make the decision about whether someone’s motivation for wanting to be ‘aggressively conventional’ (PG introduces a new term here - presumably ‘woke’ is too inflammatory) is well-founded, or if they’re holding back necessary progress. PG seems to fancy himself as that arbiter, but I’m not convinced the argument is being made in good faith.

Re: The Four Quadrants of Conformism

#676

Post by nitrogen »

joshuamorton wrote: post #651
nitrogen wrote: post #646

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IMO the more charitable reading of that is "everything [I've heard about the] protestors doing", in which case the blame lies on biased information sources, not directly on our fellow commenter. So, again IMO, a productive reply might be, "Data shows that most of the protestors are peaceful, but I do acknowledge there are some bad actors that are getting the bulk of the attention. Maybe we can brainstorm solutions to…

You've sidestepped the main point, which was that they first escalated and then you've made it the other person's responsibility to de-escalate. I'm asking why it is not the original persons' responsibility to pick their words carefully so as to not escalate in the first place.

I just replied at the bottom of the thread. I'm not trying to single you out. Everyone has their part to play, but someone has to go first.

[As an aside, I just realized this is where a neutral arbiter can be valuable, someone who can say calmly what either side can't. I am thinking specifically about a STTNG episode.]

Re: The Four Quadrants of Conformism

#677

Post by hackinthebochs »

AlexandrB wrote: post #436
enoch_r wrote: post #382

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Kindness Yoga shut down after their pro-BLM posts online were criticized as "performative activism" by employees: https://coloradosun.com/2020/06/29/kindness-yoga-closure-dur... A woman in Kentucky was fired after 20 years from her job as a Hearing Instrument Specialist after she said she didn't support BLM in a facebook video: https://reclaimthenet.org/tabitha-morris-cancel-culture/ (Her GoFundMe was also shut down.…

Whenever I see lists like this, what's interesting to me is what's omitted. In this particular case I don't see mention of workers getting fired for trying to organize or advocate for unions[1]. I don't see the abuse that gets piled on cops who report the misdeeds of their colleagues[2]. And I don't see the NFL effectively blacklisting Colin Kaepernick for his views on police brutality. It seems like it's only "cance…

But companies firing organizing workers isn't an example of cancel culture. Why would you be surprised that someone answered the question asked, and not a different question?

Re: The Four Quadrants of Conformism

#678

Post by AnimalMuppet »

kristianc wrote: post #674
pjscott wrote: post #671

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Regarding your first paragraph, consider these two claims: 1. Progress comes from people who are willing to ignore conventional wisdom and social norms. 2. The conventional wisdom is mostly wise, and social norms evolved in ways that are mostly good. These claims don't conflict. It's entirely possible for independent thinkers to be mostly wrong, much wronger than the mainstream, and to be essential for progress. Most…

> These claims don't conflict. It's entirely possible for independent thinkers to be mostly wrong, much wronger than the mainstream, and to be essential for progress. Most changes may not be improvements, but every improvement is still a change. Which is precisely why this framework is too reductive to be of any real explanatory value. At some point, someone has to make the decision about whether someone’s motivation…

> ‘aggressively conventional’ (PG introduces a new term here - presumably ‘woke’ is too inflammatory)

"Woke" is too limited. It may be the current form of "aggressively conventional", but there were others before it, there will be others after it, and there are others than it right now.

Also, "woke" was once aggressively independent (probably before the term "woke" was used). Now it's aggressively conventional - though it may be a parody of what the independents meant.

Re: The Four Quadrants of Conformism

#679

Post by igorstellar »

__alexs wrote: post #652
neonate wrote: post #574

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's because the pendulum has taken a noticeable swing in the reverse direction, with online mobs getting people fired because of opinions they've expressed. Extreme labels like "white supremacist" and "Nazi" are being put on people for views that deviate from approved ideology. This is creating a climate of fear in which each case of someone getting fired is enough to cow thousands if not millions of observers, who…

These hypothetical people are getting fired because their words cause real harm to people. They encourage others to act in ways that result in (not at all hypothetical) physical, emotional and economic harm, usually to underrepresented groups who are least able to weather it. You'd get fired if you punched a coworker, getting fired for speech that encourages others to do the punching seems like fair game. If you're i…

> These hypothetical people are getting fired because their words cause real harm to people.

These people are not hypothetical and the statement is dehumanization. If you punch a coworker they will have a damage that could be measured and reported. On the other side you won't be able to measure how offended someone is (unless it goes against the law). Cancelling people for having their own ideas even if they are different from what is conventional transforms into a witch hunt for a "greater good".

Re: The Four Quadrants of Conformism

#680

Post by pjscott »

oramit wrote: post #640
marvin wrote: post #573

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'll hazard a guess: PG went out on a limb a few years ago, and actually published a long essay on one of the ideas that are very controversial in the sense implied in this essay. Namely, how tech tools as a primary driver for increasing wealth inequality will likely grow in importance, leading to increased wealth inequality, and that this is in itself not a problem. This was after years of pointing out that it's not…

I appreciate the response. I'm not certain which essay you are referring to so I can't comment on it or the backlash it received specifically. In this "Quadrants" essay PG clearly aligns himself with the entrepreneurial free-thinkers, who bravely face down the mob. The problem with this though is he doesn't seem to be able to handle the criticism part. He acknowledges it is going to happen but when he gets dunked on…

Sounds like this essay, "Economic Inequality":

http://paulgraham.com/ineq.html

And here's the HN thread from when it was first written:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10826838

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